A new Pediatrics study examines traffic injury rates among booster-seat aged children before and after the implementation of New York State’s 2005 law requiring booster seats.
In the study, injury rate for motor vehicle crashes decreased by 18% for children 4 to 6 years of age after the NY state law requiring booster seats was implemented in 2005. The decrease in child injuries was primarily attributed to a 72% increase in the use of child restraints as required by the NY state law.
The study was conducted by the New York State Department of Health’s Bureau of Injury Prevention and funded by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, and the New York Governor’s Traffic Safety Committee.
The goals of the Doris Duke Fellowships are: to create new knowledge on the dynamics of child maltreatment and effective prevention strategies; emphasize the importance of prevention by increasing scholarship in the field; and develop new leaders in prevention.
The fellowships will provide stipends of $50,000 over two years to 15 doctoral students from a variety of academic disciplines to conduct research on the prevention of child abuse and neglect. In addition to financial support, fellows will also receive mentoring and professional development, as well as peer-to-peer networking opportunities.
A new website – BullyingInfo.org – now allows for an easy, more centralized and accessible location for federal anti-bullying resources.
Launched by the U.S. Department of Education, the website includes the topics discussed at the Department of Education's first-ever bullying summit, hosted in conjunction with the departments of Justice, Health and Human Services, Agriculture, Defense, and Interior. The summit focused on three areas: (1) present and future research; (2) programs that work; and (3) local, state, and federal bullying prevention policies.
According to Kevin Jennings, Assistant Deputy Secretary for the Department of Education's Office of Safe and Drug-Free Schools, the Department will compile the ideas presented at the summit and "use them as a framework to map out a national anti-bullying strategy in the coming weeks and months."
Falls Prevention Awareness Day will be celebrated on September 23, 2010. This national initiative is a great opportunity for public health practitioners to educate the public about falls prevention initiatives and to promote and increase public awareness about how to prevent and reduce falls among older adults.
The National Council on Aging's (NCOA) Center for Healthy Aging website featuring Falls Prevention Awareness Day 2010 has a variety of tools and resources that states and communities can use to promote fall prevention.
In recent years, a little noticed shift has been transforming suburbia: the home of the middle class has become the home of the working poor. As a result, roadways that were built for cars are now used by a growing population that can’t afford to drive. The consequences can be deadly.
PBS program, Need to Know, teamed up with Blueprint America -- an unprecedented multi-platform initiative -- to convey the experiences of residents within an Atlanta suburb where a highway dividing the town makes pedestrian safety a major concern.
CDC’s Injury Center recently partnered with the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) to develop sports-specific concussion awareness and management educational materials help improve prevention, recognition, and response to concussions among college and university athletes. This initiative includes posters for every NCAA sport, fact sheets for coaches and athletes, and content for coaches' and athletic trainers' handbooks. Earlier this year, NCAA disseminated two posters and fact sheets for coaches and athletes to each member campus along with updated concussion response guidelines.
Many rural communities are facing challenges, including rapid growth at metropolitan edges, declining rural populations, and loss of working lands. This report, developed by the International City/County Management Association (ICMA) and the Smart Growth Network, focuses on smart growth strategies that can help guide growth in rural areas, while protecting natural and working lands and preserving the rural character of existing communities. These strategies are based around three central goals:
To support the rural landscape by creating an economic climate that enhances the viability of working lands and conserves natural lands;
To help existing places to thrive by taking care of assets and investments such as downtowns, main streets, existing infrastructure, and places that the community values; and
To create great new places by building vibrant, enduring neighborhoods and communities that people, especially young people, don’t want to leave.
